So that takes us up to, what? About November of 2008. Sephora has now been in prison for almost two years. The Appellate Division and the federal court in Rochester have been tried and found wanting. The Attorney Grievance Committee harbors some shameful – really criminal – and clandestine approval of prosecutorial misconduct, such that when a defense attorney goes to them with that issue they respond by immediately exonerating the prosecutor without investigating anything and intimidate the defense attorney, opening an investigation into his conduct for daring to complain about the prosecutor although of course they will say it’s for something else. And they insist that this mindless perfidy is to be kept deathly quiet. It’s all a big secret.

From an attorney “discipline” standpoint – and I put that word in quotations because it is obviously so selectively applied as to be laughable – the Appellate Division and the Attorney Grievance Committee are basically the same thing. They live in the same building, with the same reception area. The Grievance Committee brings its proceedings against attorneys in the Appellate Division, which admits attorneys to practice in New York and oversees them and disciplines them unless they are prosecutors or government lawyers or big firm lawyers in which case the Appellate Division covers up the wrongdoing and attacks the victims of it.

So, you know, I’m thinking this is really fucked up. Too completely and utterly fucked up to put with anymore, and if I put up with it I’m as guilty as them.

Happily, and as it happens, if you are an attorney you can also go to this very same Appellate Division and tell them how fucked up they are and how you are not going to put up with their shit anymore and they have crossed the line into criminal conduct and, you know, you quit. So that’s what I did in December of ‘08:

And at about the same time there was this thing that had been bothering me about the conviction of Michael Skakel. So I found out who his lawyers were and contacted them. For some reason that seemed appropriate to me since I was resigning as an attorney. It was like cleaning up a loose end. That whole thing is really OT, as they say, but if you want a little background you can look here.